Gateway Media Literacy Partners

Board Member News

Gateway Media Literacy Partners, Inc president, Jessica Z. Brown, and longtime GMLP member, Anne Bader, attended  Free Press’s 2008 National Conference for Media Reform, held in Minneapolis, June 5-6.  Here is Jessica’s report:

Anne Bader and I got hit by a deer on our way home from Minnesota, last month!  We don’t know what happened to the poor deer!  We do know, however, WE must have looked  like deer caught in headlights following the scary incident!  I guess we were just thankful we were not hurt, the car was still driving and the deer didn’t land up in our laps.  We were totally amazed, yes indeed.  Beyond that slight interruption of the trip home, I strongly believe our eyes were also wide open fondly recalling our experiences being among more than 3,000 participants in Minneapolis, at the Media Reform Conference. 

As with all good conferences, you have to decide, among too many great offerings (I kept referring to this conference as “too much birthday cake”).  I had decided to focus on journalism, blogging, newspapers and youth media, in addition to plenary sessions.  I felt focused.   .

Beyond the good feeling of focusing on content,  I can’t communicate enough  how, yet again, we were  so “moved” by the general tenor of the conference, and  by the cross-section of people making their way to Minnesota to show unity in challenging media in this country, today.  This is a remarkable growing movement that believes our freedom and basic rights are at stake, and that our country needs to see more varied media, with more of our voices being heard, and more of our nation’s communities being represented.

The energy in the Minneapolis Convention Hall was electrifying, and the applause for such media reform leaders-- journalist, Bill Moyers, FCC Commissioners, Jonathan Adelstein and Michael Copps,  noted media reform activist, author and educator, Robert McChesney,  and  many more names we’re just getting to know--was absolutely thunderous.  I thought, sometimes, we’d levitate.

As president of a growing membership organization focused on supporting and sustaining media literacy, here in the St. Louis region, I was especially pleased to  hear--among many educators, journalists, scholars, young people seniors, media makers, activists, artists and public policy makers, with whom we had a chance to connect--that media literacy education is important to them.  Moreover, I and am heartened to have heard a couple of people at microphones calling for media literacy education as a vehicle toward change and better democracy.

Anne and I also had the great pleasure of connecting with Free Press board member, John Nichols (see photo below), with whom a few words were spoken about the need to advocate for media literacy education  among school boards and educators.  I’ll hope to resume that conversation with John, soon! 

For Lessig’s and other NCMR presentations,  please visit http://www.freepress.net/conference

This fourth conference clearly signals the next chapter of a well-oiled effort to bring disparate groups together to attend to our democracy and safeguard the many voices that comprise our unique country. 

I am especially moved by the work GMLP is doing here in our region to support and sustain media literacy in our communities. 

Finally, I am even more convinced the timing for media literacy education couldn’t be better!

EARNS EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP DOCTORATE FROM SLU

Congratulations to Tom Cornell, Communication Art Coordinator, Ferguson Florissant School District.  He’s earned his Ed.D in Educational Leadership from St. Louis University and is poised to help the community understand the need to support media literacy education on an ongoing basis.  “ I believe that now and in the future, our students will need to possess critical skills in media literacy so  they will be able to function successfully in their daily lives and in their careers,” Cornell says.  For a more definitive take on Tom’s quote, please go to this Link and see “Media Literacy in K-12 Public Education,” a document relating media literacy to grade level expectations from the Missouri Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education DESE).  Items on the state MAP test come directly from the grade level expectations,” he explains.  

PRESENTS WHITE PAPER ON ONLINE CHILD EXPLOITATION

Lynne Lang and BJC 's HealthCare School Outreach & Youth Development arm have been exceptionally busy with some notable initiatives. Curriculum specialist Lang attended Missouri’s first Summit on Online Child Exploitation, in December, having been asked to write a White Paper whose executive summary provided a template for legislation recommendations, many of which the Missouri Senate passed before the close of the session.  A research segment on global online child endangerment Lang included in the paper grew into a body of work that led to an invitation to present her work at the International Council of Psychologogists Conference in St. Petersburg, Russia, in July.  (We'll do a follow-up!) ..... Also,the Fetzer Institute and KETC Channel 9 invited BJC School Outreach to create a high school curriculum fostering love and forgiveness.. Lang created “The Forgiveness Factor,”  and piloted the project with five classes.”  Here are some of student comments, on the heels of their work:: “It has made me a happier person.”  “I have forgiven a lot of people lately.”   “I told her I was sorry and that I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings with what I said, and now we are like best friends.”  Lang, who is also GMLP’s program committee chair, says, ”Our  work really helps others to see themselves in a better light and especially helps children to be safer, happier and healthier….that’s the goal.”

 

WINS EMMY NOMINATION

Tom Atwood, independent documentarian and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville lecturer, last year produced the media literacy documentary, “Selling Children, featuring Patrick M. Murphy Julie Smith, Art Silverblatt and Lynne Lang.  .    The  30-minute documentary has been nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Public Affairs Program by the Atlanta Southeast Region of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS)” To access a  representative sample, catch one of two four-minute segments online:: A QUICKTIME, higher-resolution version is posted on Tom’s web site:  

http://web.mac.com/atwoodtom/tomatwood.net/Selling_Children.html

A second lower resolution version, almost anyone with a computer can see, is here: :

http://tomatwoodvideo.blogspot.com/2007/09/selling-children.html

ATTENDS  HHS/MFH TOWN HALL MEETING ON HEALTH LITERACY

Representing GMLP and the National Association of Media Literacy Education,

Jessica Z. Brown was invited by the Missouri Foundation of Health (MFH)  to attend one of four U.S. Department of Health and Human Services town hall meetings on improving  health literacy, May 16.   The MFH is a model in the U.S. in terms of its focused grants targeting specific health issues, health literacy being one of them

“There is a vital link between health and media literacy,” Brown says. “Being able to underscore to town hall leaders the need to go beyond the traditional view of health literacy—- applying literacy skills to health-related materials like prescriptions, appointment cards, directions for home health care, medicine labels, for example—and push for critical thinking skills that media literacy education prompts, is key.”   “It was gratifying to hear leaders in the field acknowledge this, now. a recognizing that media literacy education leads to survival skills that help deal with health-related messages we read, see and hear via our mass communications channels., Brown added.”

Brown noted her pleasure in hearing some of the country’s health literacy leaders,  among them, St. Louis University’s’s Matthew Kreuter, Director, the Health Communication Research Laboratory,  University of Missouri’s  Glen Cameron, Principal Investigator, the Maxine Wilson Gregory Chair in Journalism Research and co-founder, the Health Communication Research Center, and Harvard University’s Rima Rudd, a leader in health literacy research.  “I’m pleased, to say the least, I heard some of these researchers confront the need for an expanded definition of health literacy, for this is really the only way we can actually achieve it.”, Brown concluded.  An HHS report on the three nationwide town hall meetings is due out in 2009.